Chapter 23 Chapter 7 Fighting Uncertainty and Rebuilding Our Relationship with the World

In 1927, Freud, the father of psychoanalysis, was approaching the twilight years of his life.He wrote a book saying that religion is an illusion, and sent a copy to Romain Rolland, the French writer and winner of the 1915 Nobel Prize in Literature. Let me explain, this Roland is not the Mrs. Roland who shouted "Freedom, freedom, how many crimes have been committed in your name".That Madame Roland shouted that famous slogan during the French Revolution in 1793 and was executed.The reason why she is called Roland is because her husband's surname is Roland. Romain Rolland was a fan of God and felt very upset, so he wrote a letter to Freud, saying that the religious feeling is not an illusion, it is "as vast as the sea", implying that Freud could not understand it. Don't talk nonsense.

After reading the letter, Freud laughed wildly "haha".Two years later, in a new book, he said that religious believers are little kids who haven't grown up psychologically, and they need a God like kids need a father. In the history of world thought, there are several people who hit religion hardest: Marx, German philosopher Feuerbach, British philosopher Russell and Freud.But the first three people attacked religion from a philosophical and political perspective, unlike Freud, who started from psychological motives. I don't want to judge religion, people who have faith are always happy.It should be pointed out that, from a psychoanalytic point of view, Freud was right about one thing: without a God, many people would not be able to live alone.

Don't think that only Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Taoism, etc. are called religions. Revolutionary movements, nationalist movements, fashion shopping, entertainment, money worship, narcissism, love, etc., all have the psychological function of religion.As Fromm said, a person's God is not necessarily those abstract personal gods or impersonal gods, but can also be a statue, a star, a pile of money, or a portrait. Man needs a God, and sometimes he very much needs an enemy.If it is said that man has a "transcendental desire" for God, the same is true for enemies.There is a country in this world that needs an enemy from the first day of its birth until now.Without an enemy, or being able to determine where an enemy is, it goes into a "nervous disorder," not knowing who it is.

This country is America. Since the founding of the country, the enemies of the United States have never been broken.At first it was Britain, then Germany, then the former Soviet Union, and now it is a "rogue state" like North Korea, and "terrorism" like "Al Qaeda".If it cannot find an opponent, the United States will draw its sword and look around in a daze, unable to find North. I guess, except for those "one-night Americans" who like to shout "freedom" slogans, but have the true biography of the Red Guards in their bones, it will not take a few brain cells for most people to understand this: When you have an opponent, what do you think of? It is how to build your own strength to beat him to the ground. If there is no opponent, where will your strength go?

For the United States, once it loses the goal of the enemy, it will fall into two kinds of anxiety at the same time. (1) Without an object to attack and defend, it means that you are in the open, completely exposed to an enemy hiding in the dark, and have no defense at all. Why did terrorism scare Americans so much in the period after 9/11?That is, you don't know where the terrorist is, when and where he plays terror, and in this way, there is no place that is psychologically safe. (2) The United States has a presupposition in building its own strength, that is, to defeat the enemy. If the enemy is lost, a punch will be empty.If you have to see who you are in the eyes of others, what should you do?Then, as long as others do not exist, oneself will be surrounded by nothingness.Solitary defeat is the lightness of life that the United States cannot afford.

For the United States, the inability to determine the existence of an enemy is more terrifying than the existence of a certain enemy! One way to test our sanity is to see if the pain of others triggers our pain.Because, logically speaking, a person's pain often explains our situation in "existence" and society, and his fate represents our common fate, but he is relatively unlucky, and the fate that belongs to everyone is concentrated in him. body only. If we are completely indifferent to the suffering of others, it proves that we are cut off from our own humanity, from our own existence.

So, the following true story is actually everyone's story.The difference is that our story is another version. There is a telephone salesman who has been tormented by a strange thing he called "procrastination" for 30 years. People are not like people, and ghosts are not like ghosts. His symptoms are: no matter what he does, as long as it is not something that makes people feel enjoyable, he always procrastinates again and again, always wanting to wait until a certain point in time to do it.Before this time point, I felt very relaxed, and I believed that I would do it after that time point, and I would do it well.But the closer he got to that time point, the more anxious he became... Finally, when that time point finally came, he would immediately find another reason to postpone this time point.Then, in a mixture of extreme frustration and yet another relief, he repeated the procrastination process.

In addition, he can use great perseverance to do some preparatory work, full of passion and hope, but once he wants to actually operate, he will feel very anxious. As a salesman who mainly communicates with customers by phone, this kind of "procrastination" made him suffer a lot.When describing this "symptom" to me, he said he wasn't afraid of the client, that the client couldn't possibly strangle him over the phone, but that he just couldn't pick up the phone.He did a lot of preparation work and read a lot of books on telephone business skills, but he couldn't beat himself.

He watched this "procrastination" drag himself into hell.He believes that without this disease, based on his IQ, he should be more than ten times better than his current situation. In terms of solutions, he once prayed to gods and Buddhas to give him strength, but it was of no use.Frustrated, he admits that gods and Buddhas seem to only help the strong and determined, and he is the trash they throw away. God only saves those who save themselves.I lit a cigarette and in the smoke I saw his great fear of not knowing what was going to happen in the future. He sets a time point, which is to isolate himself from the future after this time point, and obtain psychological protection.Until that point comes, he's safe.And when it does come, his fear prompts him to set a new time point, which in turn uses it to maintain his sense of security.

The problem wasn't that he was afraid of what would happen in the future, but that he didn't know what was going to happen.If he knows what kind of catastrophic event will be after the time point, that is, if he is sure what will happen and tells himself that he can bear it, "procrastination" will be eliminated. An iron psychological rule is: If a person knows what is going to happen in the future, he can still grasp it, control it, and cope with it.But if he doesn't know, and doesn't have a pre-psychological defense against what might happen, he can only be overwhelmed by anxiety.

In the TV series, the most important reason why Li Yunlong fights so well is that he uses uncertainty to make it a sharp weapon to attack the enemy.He does not play cards according to common sense, so that the enemy has no way of predicting what he will do, let alone responding. There are often such scenes in movies and TV shows: A is a policeman, B is a gangster boss, A's brother is killed by B, and B is chased to an abandoned factory building. B is hiding in the dark, and A is pointing east and west with a gun in the light, searching for B carefully. B smirked twice, just teasing A, but he didn't dare to fight openly like a man.This drove A into a rage, and shouted at the top of his voice, "Get the fuck out of me!" I can guarantee that even if B didn't kill A's brother, at that time, A had the heart to tear B to pieces.Teasing and threatening a person from the shadows is an unrivaled form of psychological torture, worse than killing a person because it places him at great risk of humiliation and uncertainty.With an identifiable object, a person can react aggressively, but if the object disappears and cannot be captured, the nerve center that responds to the world is paralyzed.And rage is the process of resisting the paralysis of the nerve center, and it is a person's instinctive psychological protection. The dreadful specter of uncertainty was captured when humans lived in primitive huts.It is mainly manifested in the moodiness of nature, and often frightens humans with "artistic techniques" such as volcanoes, earthquakes, thunder, and rain. In order to avoid uncertainty, human beings have come up with a way to respect it and bribe it, so as to comfort themselves psychologically, and be sure that the natural gods and ghosts will see that they are filial to them and will not harm themselves.Thus, for the first time in human history, such things as religion and knowledge appeared, and the ancestors of modern intellectuals - wizards. What do wizards do?It is to use his set of "knowledge" to communicate between people and gods and ghosts, and to establish a definite relationship and structure between people and the outside world.What is the nature of knowledge?It is used to tame uncertainty.As long as you have knowledge about something, no matter whether you really understand it or not, at least there is no chaos in the depths of your spiritual structure, and psychologically, you can already grasp and deal with it , Be defensive! Therefore, Russell said, Westerners have adopted three methods in dealing with uncertainty: theology, science and philosophy. Theology is never humble, so God is set to be all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good.As long as one gets the love of God, dealing with uncertainty seems to be a piece of cake; as for philosophy, it mainly clarifies thoughts and logical confusion, explores the truth of the world at the most basic and ultimate level, and is known as the highest palace of human wisdom. I like to play, but I can't play; compared with them, science seems to be awesome, because it sees many laws that govern nature, and it will produce huge material power.That's why Archimedes was so confident, saying that as long as others give him a fulcrum, he can move the earth. But before modern times, science was still weak, and the sacred feat of taming uncertainty was mainly done by religion and philosophy. However, since the appearance of Newton, who saw the gravitational force from the falling motion of an apple, and then used the classical mechanics theory to build a modern scientific building, the situation is different.The masses of the people went crazy because they discovered that many theories in science can actually produce steam engines, electric lights, cameras, automobiles, airplanes, and other miraculous gadgets that could never be imagined before. Scientists are also fanatical. The great impetus of science to the industrial revolution and social progress makes them feel that there is no uncertainty in this world at all, and everything is under the control of scientific laws and principles. The only thing humans have to do is To understand these laws and master these principles.They advocate that the world is actually a complex structure woven by a dense network of causal relationships. As long as a certain point is determined in this structure, another point can be determined by pushing the causal relationship.The French scientist Laplace once bragged about it and imitated Archimedes, saying that as long as he is given a set of scientific laws, he can know the state of the universe at a certain moment. Science seems to have become greater than God, becoming the standard for judging everything, just like the "Bed of Procrustes" in ancient Greek mythology.In this standard bed, you grow longer?Sorry, it exceeds the length of the bed, and the feet have to be cut off; grow shorter?Also sorry, had to lengthen the body a bit.For science, witchcraft, folk beliefs, qigong, and health preservation are all superstitions and very ignorant things, because they have no "scientific basis."Now, even traditional Chinese medicine, which has guaranteed the health of Chinese people for thousands of years, is considered a pseudoscience in the eyes of Comrade Fang Zhouzi, a great "fighter against fakes", because it does not meet the "scientific standards" of Western medicine. In the frenzy of science, even Einstein, one of the Jewish giants and the giant of science, was not exempt.He has a famous saying: "God does not play dice." It means that this world is certain. However, as soon as Einstein finished speaking, the Danish physicist Bohr sneered and said that this is pure nonsense, and many things are just probabilities.Heisenberg, Bohr’s comrade-in-arms in the same trench and a physicist of the Copenhagen School, even played with the "uncertainty principle", which shook the building of classical physics. The "uncertainty principle" says that when we want to observe something under a microscopic phenomenon, we need to use instruments.However, the instrument and the thing we want to observe will interact, thereby changing the state of that thing; then, what we see is not that thing, but a new thing after our instrument interacts with that thing.Inference, in the real world, our state of activity will change the state of what we want to observe.For example, if you look at what you saw ten years ago when you are ten years later, the result will definitely be different.It’s the same between people. When you unconsciously give someone a hypocritical expression, it has already changed his attitude towards you. Do you still think he is sincere to you? The truth needs to be spoken viciously: our entire lives are, by nature, almost surrounded by uncertainty.The reason why many things feel certain is that we have dressed ourselves in defense against uncertainty in terms of mental structure and psychological structure! As I said before, uncertainty is a huge psychological threat to us.Of course we will not just submit and wait for death. Now let us think about a question first. When we see a terrifying shadow in the dark, why do we first feel that it is a "ghost"? You may think that it is because we have a concept of "ghost", the frightening shadow that flashes past is a bit like a ghost.I would say that such an answer is logically wrong!We also have the concept of "person", why not perceive this shadow as a person?The essence of the problem is not to describe a psychological feeling corresponding to a certain idea, but to explain the reasons for a certain psychological tendency. Let's think about another question: From ancient times to the present, when people encounter some mysterious phenomenon that they cannot explain, they always instinctively regard it as the work of gods or devils, in short, it is a kind of divine power or magical power. Why? When these two problems are combined, a shocking secret is revealed: it turns out that we live in this world, and we have a priori a spiritual structure of "self-object". Things that affect the "self" are instantly incorporated into the structure and become a definite object, no matter whether the object is a human or a ghost! Here, I briefly explain what is meant by the mental structure of the "ego-object".To put it bluntly, the spiritual structure is the content that has been deposited in the depths of the mind psychologically and intellectually. It is a dark container that stores the most secret instructions in our hearts.When it wants to drive our machine, it reflects it through psychology and movement.And a structure such as "self-object" actually adds a direction when establishing our relationship with the external world.This direction is either simply from us pointing to the outside world, or simply from the outside world pointing to us, or this pointing is mutual. A structural relationship such as "self-world" is called a "subject-object" structural relationship in philosophy. It seems unfathomable, but there is no need to be nervous. Here, we see that when the force is directed from man to the external world, he has a sense of power because he is the subject at this time; and when the force is directed from the external world to him, he will be psychologically threatened, Because at this time he is the object. As we have said before, the direction of force determines the strengths and weaknesses of the mind, and no matter whether the force is directed from us to the outside world or from the outside world to us, the prerequisite for our mind not to collapse and actions to be possible is that we have Identify a subject! Therefore, when a terrifying black shadow appears in front of us, because it is threatening, we must immediately respond to it psychologically and identify it as a "ghost".Only when we are certain of this can we be psychologically defensive, and if we don't know what it is, our defenses will collapse completely.With defense, at most it is fear, but without defense, it is anxiety that is more terrible than fear. Think about it, when you are walking on the street and someone suddenly pats you on the shoulder from behind, is your first reaction to turn your head away immediately and prepare to attack the other party, and you will not relax until you find out that the other party is an acquaintance down?It's too general to explain your reaction in terms of instinct.To be precise, the mental structure of your "self-world" is activated, as long as the outside world collides with your "self", you will automatically react to it as an object that can be defended and attacked.Therefore, when you are in depression and fear, and sometimes you have no time to react, and the mental structure of the "self-world" is a little dull and numb, and someone pats you on the shoulder, you will feel instantly engulfed by fear! When we say "self," it means that there must be an "other."That is to say, as long as we think or feel the existence of "self", we also presuppose or promise the existence of "other".In this world, logically speaking, many things are in pairs, like true and false, good and evil, right and wrong, good and bad, big and small, all of which are like this.You cancel one of them, and the other disappears. Why do people have a "self-object" spiritual structure?Asking this question is equivalent to asking: Why do dogs have backbones?Break the backbone and the dog becomes paralyzed.Similarly, by disintegrating this "self-object" mental structure, man reverts to the animal state.It is the innate configuration of human beings to survive in this world. According to the "Bible", people have a consciousness of "I" and can recognize good and evil. After eating the forbidden fruit, they were expelled from the Garden of Eden.This is a very vivid and profound metaphor.What's the meaning?That is to say, people are completely integrated with the world, they are a part of the world, there is no distinction between "I" and "object", and they are happy.However, once a person has a consciousness of "I", he is separated from the world, and the world becomes the "object" of his observation, cognition, and desire. In this way, knowledge is produced.There is a "self-object" structure between him and the world, that is, a "subject-object" structure. If you don't jump out of Mount Lushan, you won't see the true face of Mount Lushan. The underdeveloped "self-object", or "subject-object" structure is a characteristic of Chinese traditional culture.In ancient times, we always talked about the unity of man and nature, and boiled man and nature in one pot. We did not prepare thinking tools and spiritual characteristics for the development of science and technology and the exploration of the world, which led to the suffering of modern times.In fact, if the relationship between people and the world is still so ambiguous, and there is no need for a "subject-object" structure to distance ourselves cognitively, maybe we are all still in the tree, so how can there be any computers or cars? It is now clear that the spiritual structure of "self-object" is a body armor carefully crafted by God to protect us from the threat of uncertainty.The problem is that there are too many bullets shot at our "self" from the outside world, and the world itself is also changing and full of uncertainties. At best, it is equivalent to Huang Rong's "soft hedgehog armor".In particular, we are ignorant of many things, and we have no certainty about the "future".So, if a bullet is fired from these places, it can easily pass over the defensive positions of our intellectual structure and directly hit the psychological structure, and we will become the prey of anxiety. Take making a choice as an example.Suppose there is a young and pretty woman Q from the countryside who met two men at the same time. He also dated other women; the other was K, an ordinary wage earner, who was more handsome, and did not date other women when he dated her.Suppose that if Q chooses them, both J and K will be Q's boyfriends and even marry her.May I ask who should Q choose? Although Q is more money-worshiping, unless she is completely brainless, it is impossible not to have choice anxiety.If she chooses J, she will certainly feel that she can change her destiny, which is what many Cinderellas yearn for.But the problem is that this choice is full of risks, because it is very possible that J will dump her after playing with her for a period of time, and her family and J are not compatible at all. In this way, her "capital" will be damaged. Certain loss.Even if she marries J, there is still the possibility of J having extramarital affairs in the future. Obviously, the pain caused by such a marriage cannot be compensated by money, and by then, her capital of appearance has been exhausted. What about choosing K?Also fraught with risk. K may just play with her when he's bored or can't find a rich woman for the time being.Even if she gets married, it doesn't rule out that she will live in poverty with K, and K doesn't know how to love her, so there is a possibility of eating, drinking, whoring and gambling outside. In other words, no matter who Q chooses, the future is full of variables and risks, and she cannot predetermine who is right to choose.This kind of choice is more like a gamble, and once you bet yourself on it, you often can't afford to lose, and you might lose all your money. In fact, modern society is a risk society, and everyone's choice will directly or indirectly affect other people's choices and consequences.Therefore, not only buying lottery tickets and speculating in stocks are classic gambling, but also love and marriage, business transactions, interpersonal games, and making friends are all gambling. As long as "now" doesn't make us feel like we've all failed, we don't always have the courage to embrace whatever the future might hold.The fear of the future full of uncertainty stems from our nostalgia for the "now". A netizen told me that he has a "fear of success".Let's all listen. We can judge at a glance that there are two factors at the same time: one is that the reason why he is so afraid of "success" is because he cannot be sure what "success" will bring him.His resistance to success is actually to keep the "now" that he doesn't want to change in his heart.Compared with "success", he doesn't know what he will become, "now" is the safest psychologically; second, he actually has no real confidence in "success", and he has no psychological preparation for things to go wrong . In addition, it cannot be ruled out that there is another very important reason, that is, he didn't really think clearly whether what he was going to do was what he wanted.If he still hesitates, when he is about to accomplish it, his inner voice will stop him, making him fear the arrival of "success", and thus find various reasons to give up. Whatever we gain or lose, a pile of money, a job offer, is a product of the "now."Therefore, because interests and the actual social structure are isomorphic, our psychological structure will be isomorphic with the actual social structure, and "now" is not just the external environment of our life, but has become a part of our psychology , whose order constitutes our mental order.Therefore, if a person thinks his "self" is irretrievable and wants to bury this "self", he will smash the "now"; if he is infinitely attached to his "self" and smashes the "now", His psychological structure will collapse. The reason why young people are happy to "rebel" is because their "self" is not completely isomorphic with "now", and they are not completely bound together.On the contrary, they have always felt the oppression and bondage of the "now", so not only do they not regret smashing it, but also feel the power of the "self"; while the psychological structure (and interest structure) of middle-aged and elderly people has been different from the "now" Embedded together, smashing the "now" is tantamount to smashing everything they have psychologically. The secret of a person becoming a religious extremist and an ideological thug is not that the religion or ideology he believes in advocates violence, but that when he seeks the shelter of his faith, he completely buries that dilapidated "self".Being a religious and ideological moderate, he will always be connected with the "past", and thus will always recognize the self in the past that must be forgotten.This disastrous connection made it difficult for him to be psychologically sure that he had been reborn. And, for him, the uncertainty of the future has never been a problem.Religious and ideological teachings have already painted a picture of heaven for him. All he needs is to listen to the voice of God and the truth and fully devote himself to it.As I have said before, this kind of person is extremely powerful psychologically. At that moment, he is "soul-possessed" and will not have any worries and anxieties about the "future". No one lives in the "future" more than this type of person.Because of the need to sever any connection between the "self" and the "present", for them, the "future", which exists only in imagination, is more real than the "present". In contrast, a believer in money and "success", even with infinite aspirations for the future, is always inevitably attacked by uncertainty.The teachings of money and "success" only seduce and promise, but cannot convincingly offer him a certain future in the name of truth.Whether he wants to gain money, or "success" in terms of power and status, he is just further packaging himself, and he has not severed his relationship with the "now" psychologically. A person who is poor but resigned to his fate will not have any hope for the future. His psychological structure has been firmly embedded in the established social status quo, and any change to the status quo may make him psychologically precarious.Similarly, a rich man who has obtained huge benefits from society is also afraid of any change, because his interests are tightly bound to the established social, political and economic order, and his "self" is precisely his status, identity, etc. Things are built, touching the status quo is tantamount to killing him. Many people live in the "past", because for them, the "now" is an unbearable spiritual hell, and the uncertainty of the future is more like laying countless traps on the way forward.Compared with them, the past has been determined, and the distance of time has covered it with a veil of beauty and warmth. Living in the "past", he has no psychological threat.The essence of living in the "past" is to replace the "past" with the "present" psychologically. Most people are perpetually oscillating in the time continuum of "past", "present" and "future".A person who cannot completely smash and abandon the "now" is psychologically open to the "future" at any time, thus putting himself under the threat of uncertainty at any time. The threat of uncertainty to us has many manifestations in life, such as hesitation in doing things, anxiety, worrying about gains and losses, weakness, fear, bewilderment, emptiness, cowardice, and drifting with the tide, feeling that you are surrounded by social tides, If you can't help but follow along, these are all manifestations of psychological weakness.They show that in the mental structure of "self-object", our "self" is either unable to determine an object, or is very powerless in front of this object. However, before talking about how to deal with the threat of uncertainty, we must first deeply analyze a sad phenomenon of human beings: why can villains always succeed in attacking gentlemen?Why is a good person always hurt?As the German philosopher Kant said, why are virtuous people not necessarily happy, and those who enjoy happiness are really villains?If we don't want to kill ourselves humanly and morally, how can we protect ourselves in this dangerous world? The French thinker Pascal said something that seems to be a tongue twister: "The madness of society is so inevitable that a person who is not mad has to prove that he is not mad by the form of madness." What does it mean?The translation is: Although logically speaking, hundreds of millions of people are mentally ill, it is not because there are so many people that this kind of illness can be said to be normal.But in the sense of society, it is true that there are many people, and the reason is that the voice is loud.Most people, if they are sick, must think that the very few who are right-minded are not.Therefore, in order to prove that one is normal, one has to be different from most people: Well, if you are sick, you say you are normal, and if you are normal, you say you are sick, then I will simply pretend to be crazy, and I look the same as you! This sounds like literati-like pique.So Fromm quickly went on to say that mental patients are actually the healthiest people, because they have not betrayed themselves, but the reality they have to resist is too strong, and they have failed in the struggle to defend themselves, and the result is mental illness.And those so-called "normal people" are precisely those who are the most seriously ill. Their "normality" is nothing more than being able to perform according to the script of the social role they play. But if an X-ray can see through their hearts, They must be savages of a cannibal tribe. Yes, there are many people who physically live in "civilized" modern society, but spiritually, they are still not evolved.Don't think that if many people can pack themselves with "civilized" etiquette, they will really become civilized people.For the Germans, "civilization" is actually a derogatory term, which generally refers to those hypocritical and pretentious decorations and games.Chinese people used to be very familiar with one thing: "civilized stick" (cane, the old Western gentleman usually likes to hold a delicate cane to show his demeanor and identity, corresponding to their straight figure and dress, it has become the signature image of Western gentlemen ——Editor's note). To make this point clear, clinical neurotic patients are actually mostly people who are not aggressive towards others. For example, people with depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive disorder can’t do anything. actions that hurt others.Cui Yongyuan, a well-known CCTV host, once admitted that he has depression, so this person is not aggressive. Compared with neurotic patients, many so-called "normal" people have a dark heart and are more or less aggressive towards others. Some people are even downright scum.Why do gossip women like to chew their tongues?It is that they perceive their own insignificance, and only by talking about others can they escape that worthless self.The less a person dares to face himself, the more he will "care" about others.The more corrupt he is by himself or others, the more aggressive he becomes outwardly. Corresponding to whether he is aggressive to the outside world, a person who refuses to sell himself is prone to clinical neurosis or even psychosis under external pressure, while a person who likes to sell himself is more likely to be a psychopath and personality disorder.Snitching, murder and arson, things like that, are usually done by psychopaths and personality disorders, and these people seem to be quite normal in the sense of "social" rather than "spiritual"! Why do good people get neurosis, but bad people are psychopathic? To demystify this, we must know what is the essence of neurosis, which is the inner conflict of people.In other words, two "selfs" are fighting, one is the "self" at the level of rationality and reality; the other is the "self" at the level of humanity and morality.What the "self" at the human and moral level should do is to supervise, judge and punish the "self" at the rational and realistic level, and prevent it from doing bad things, or even having the idea of ​​doing bad things. Suppose there are two people A and B, the former is a morally principled person, while the latter's only principle is profit, and they have entered a company together.Everyone knows that the world is dangerous, and you only know that it is not enough to do a good job foolishly. If a person wants to be in the top position, he often has to learn to watch his words, take the initiative to flatter, join a circle, and even plot against others. For A and B, the situation faced by their "self" at the rational level and the realistic level is the same, and they must face reality squarely.However, if A is required to act like a dog for the sake of superiority, actively flatter the leader, or even plot against others, he will feel that this violates his code of conduct, and he will never do such a thing.We can say that at this time, it was his human and moral "self" that prevented him from doing that.If he has to do it, he will be punished by the "self" at the human and moral level, and there will be a voice in his heart telling him that this is betraying himself!And if he wants to exchange his ego for benefits, no matter how much he gains, he can't save himself from the failure of life.The more serious the inner conflict, the more severe the punishment of the "self" on the human and moral level. Do you see it?一个有道德原则的人，内心冲突很剧烈时，他对自己的惩罚就越重。也就是说，当一件事情让他受到生命的挫折时，他攻击的对象是自己！在心理上，其结果就是他不能将那些导致自己得“病”的东西，通过攻击性的语言和行为发泄出去，从而越积越多，导致了神经症。这就是为什么越是善良的人，在某些事情中越不会怪别人，而是斥责、痛恨自己的原因！ 但对于没有道德原则的B来说，情况就完全不一样了。他从一开始就已经杀死了人性和道德。在干这些事情时，他并没有内心冲突，出卖自己时毫无心理障碍。 他不能逃避的，只是被杀死的人性仍然在内心深处复活，并且严厉谴责他。按照存在的规定性，一个人是不能这样干的，所以，他会产生自我憎恨，恨自己居然把自己弄成了这样。可是，这种自我憎恨不能让自己感觉到。So what to do?恨别人！所以，这类人只是心理变态，而不是得神经症！ 对于一个善良的人来说，攻击别人是一种罪过；但对于一个没有道德感的人来说，攻击别人不仅是一种乐趣，而且是一种自我救赎的方式。前者来到这个世界上，好像是时时用道德来监督自己；而后者在这个世界上，似乎就是为了攻击别人而来。 问题是，一个有道德感的人、一个喜欢攻击别人的心理阴暗者，和不确定性这样的东西怎么扯到一起的呢？ “有道德”意味着什么？意味着他谨守社会的道德规范，并用它来约束自己。也就是说，只要你确定了一种道德规范，比如应讲诚信，那么，你在和一个讲诚信的人交往时，基本上就确定了他的行为，他只要向你借钱，那么，还钱是肯定的。但是，如果一个人没有道德，那还不还钱就不是一件确定的事情了，他的行为已经超出了“诚信”这个道德规范的控制范围。 虽然现在已经不是多“子曰”几下就能忽悠人的年代了，但有一句“孟子曰”的这个还是挺有道理的，可以搬出来用用：没有道德，人就“异于禽兽者几希”。问题只在于，在遵守道德规范时，一定要注意它在心理上的深远后果，那就是会让你在和别人相处时，一定程度上解除了心理防御的武装，暴露在他人的火力之下。好人吃亏，就吃亏在这点上！ 比如信任。请想一下，当你信任一个人的时候，这对于你的心理状态来说意味着什么？意味着你的心理结构对于他是开放的，你的自我暴露在他的面前。 当我们对一个人主动表示好感，但他却冷漠地对待我们时，我们为什么会恼羞成怒？或者，为什么当我们对一个人寄予希望，而他却让我们失望时，我们为什么有点恨他？这类心理现象，根本就不是一句别人不给我们面子就可以得到解释的。我们单方面地对一个人投入好感，投入希望，意味着我们已经主动地和他建立了一种不对等的互动关系，我们暴露了真实的自己，而他的自我却完全是隐藏的，因为这种自我暴露，我们处于心理的劣势。所以，我们迫切希望他也能投桃报李，回以好感，满足我们的希望；如不能做到，至少要表示抱歉之类，从而平衡不对等的互动关系。一旦不是这样，我们就会感觉到一种羞辱、发怒和恨，就是以对他进行攻击的方式，来对我们居然愚蠢地暴露自我，主动和他建立一种不对等的互动关系进行强烈的反弹。而恨他，实际上就是在恨我们自己。 所以，当一个人向你表示好感时，虽然不需要表现得受宠若惊，但回以谢意和友好是必要的。而当你的亲人、你的领导、你的朋友对你有所希望的时候，那就要争取不让他们失望，即使你无法做到，也要显得你很在乎他们的希望，并为此而努力。 有道德感的人不仅在和他人相处时容易成为他人的靶子，他对外界还缺少进攻性。这两个弱点使他更多时候成为一个受伤害的人，而不是一个伤害别人的人。 那么，一个讲道德的人，在一个无德之徒面前是不是应该举手投降了呢？不，我们并不需要在人性和道德上把自己也杀死才能保护自己。无德之徒对于我们的优势只是，他做事没有心理障碍，没有底线，而我们却有道德压力，有原则。通过道德规范，给定一个事情发生，他可以预测和确定我们出什么牌，而我们无法玩这一手，导致在博弈时他在暗处，而我们在明处。所以，问题的关键是，我们必须驯服不确定性。 我们在遵守一种道德规范时，总希望对方也遵守，比如，我们讲诚信，总希望对方也讲诚信。我要说，这样做只是在给自己设套，相当于预设了自己可能被伤害的结果，因为对方不讲诚信的可能性根本无法排除，而我们对这种可能性并没有心理上的防御。在这种情况下，我们的受伤其实有一半是自己干的。所以，必须转变观念。讲道德从内心里来说并不是为了得到什么，而是为了人格的完善。它的价值在于我们的行为，而不是行为的结果。 还记得前面我们所说的在街头丢一块钱给乞丐的例子吗？如果丢一块钱下去，只是为了让你感觉到自己是一个有同情心的人，而不是关心乞丐是不是在行骗，你就驯服了不确定性对你情绪的掠动。 是我们的内心和行为在遵守道德规范，而不是大脑在遵守！所以，在和别人的博弈中，一定不要被情境淹没，无论别人是否可以把你当成客体，你都要保持敏锐的头脑，把他当成一个客体来分析和预测，正如一个遵守道德规范的人在出牌时可以预测一样，一个道德上的白痴或无赖，他的行为也是有迹可循的。你可以判断他是一个什么人，从他的言行中预测他的行为，并判断哪些是他要做的，哪些可能是假像。做到这一点，不确定性就不可能成为他杀伤你的武器。